A blog about the return to the 'source country' of cultural property removed before the implementation of the 1970 UNESCO Convention, treated separately from the issue of ongoing looting and theft.

Monday, November 17, 2014

Montezuma headdress goes into storage

The quetzal-feather headdress, or penacho, supposedly once worn by
Montezuma somehow ended up in the collection of the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand II von Tyrol and has been in Austria since 1596. It is currently housed at
Vienna’s Weltmuseum. On November 2, the museum closed its doors in order to undertake a
two-year rebranding. Its vast collection will now be placed into vaults.
Now, as a beloved part of Mexico’s heritage disappears from view for an
uncertain period of time, it is a perfect time to figure out how to get
the penacho back home.

According to Gerard van Bussel, curator of Montezuma’s penacho, 5
percent of the museum’s attendees are Mexican nationals--who don’t have
to pay admission.
“It’s our little gift to Mexico,” Bussel says.
Many Mexicans are surprised to learn that the penacho exhibited at the
National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City is a 1940 replica paid by
President Abelardo Rodríguez.
The president had seen the original during a state visit to Vienna and
wanted Mexico to have a copy.
“One can feel more the spiritual force seeing it here than the replica,”
says Guillermo García Perez, a retired mathematics teacher who made the
journey with his family. “I think about the greatness of the Mexica,
the Aztecs. It should be taken to Mexico. It’s a treasure.”
The reasons why it hasn’t been taken to Mexico are many. In a two-year
joint study by Austria and Mexico between 2010 and 2012, it was
concluded that moving the headdress could cause irreparable damage.

About Me

British archaeologist living and working in Warsaw, Poland. Since the early 1990s (or even longer) a primary interest has been research on artefact hunting and collecting and the market in portable antiquities in the international context and their effect on the archaeological record.